Pubdate: 5 November 1998 Source: Seattle-Times (WA) Copyright: 1998 The Seattle Times Company Contact: http://www.seattletimes.com/ Author: Jim Brunner, Seattle Times Snohomish County bureau SULTAN COMES DOWN HARD ON TEEN SMOKERS SULTAN - Richard Sims knew cigarettes could be expensive, but he never expected to shell out $190 for a couple of smoke breaks. Yet that's what the sandy-haired high-school senior paid for two smoking tickets handed out by a small-city police force that practically has made underage smoking public enemy No. 1. In the past 15 months, Sultan's nine-member police department has slapped 120 tickets on minors caught with cigarettes or chewing tobacco. They also have hauled adolescent smokers in front of a community panel to ask why they smoke, sent them to smoking-cessation classes and ordered them to perform community service. It's hard to say whether they have persuaded teens in Sultan to smoke less or just to hide it better. But while some folks think officers ought to worry about other matters, Police Chief Fred Walser is determined to fight teen smoking, which is on the rise in Snohomish County and Washington state. It wasn't always this way. Sultan used to be like many places: Teens would smoke, and adults would frown but mostly look the other way. Sims and other young smokers would hang out and share cigarettes behind the gym or in the school parking lot. After school, some would congregate in front of the public library on Main Street. Local business owners complained about youths yelling at pedestrians, and tossing soda cans and cigarette butts in flower pots. Folks were getting fed up, says Walser, a towering man who has been in law enforcement for 31 years, and became police chief of this city of 2,800 in 1996. "They'd hang out down there and spit and smoke and swear," Walser says. "One of the first things that greeted me was the question, `What are you going to do about our blankety-blank kids hanging out on Main Street?' " Walser, who sees smoking as a gateway to alcohol, marijuana and juvenile crime, decided his officers would stop looking the other way. At the time, minors couldn't legally buy Camels or chew Skoal, but possession was technically OK. Walser persuaded the City Council to pass an ordinance in February 1997 that explicitly banned tobacco possession by minors and imposed hefty fines for violators, starting at $95. The state Legislature approved a similar measure for all of Washington earlier this year. Sultan police passed out warning fliers for six months and started enforcing the law in July 1997, handing out 84 citations in the first six months. Walser thinks the efforts have paid off. Teens are no longer smoking openly at school, and complaints about juvenile crime have dropped 65 percent, he says. Judy Perkins, who runs a gift shop downtown, thinks Walser has worked wonders. "It's like heaven here now. We used to have garbage in the street, kids hanging around, tossing cigarettes in the street," she says, pointing to the corner where teens used to cluster. "I can see a tremendous improvement in our youth out here." Sims may be one of the success stories. Before he quit four months ago, he had smoked for more than 10 years, trying his first cigarette at age 7, and stashing away cartons of Lucky Strikes and Marlboros by the time he turned 13. He got his first ticket when he was sneaking a puff with friends on the school lawn. Sultan police Officer Jeff Shelton spied on the smokers from the bushes, videotaping them before passing out $95 tickets. Later, Sims tried smoking behind the school gym, but Shelton nailed him again - and another $95 went down the drain. Sims paid off his fine working at the local Dairy Queen and his father's restaurant-supply business. He is 18 now and can buy cigarettes legally, but he says getting busted as a minor - plus a desire to join the wrestling team - helped persuade him to kick the habit. "A pack of cigarettes isn't really worth that much, I guess," he says. He now chews gum compulsively. Not everyone is so accommodating. Rick Sims was hopping mad after his son got two smoking tickets. "I just didn't approve of them sitting there videotaping kids smoking a goddanged cigarette. It's not like they were smoking dope," Sims says. "I think we've got a lot of other issues to worry about in life and to have police officers on campus to issue tickets for smoking. I think they can do something better with their time." Andria Gee's 15-year-old daughter was cited last month for smoking at school and given a $50 ticket - Sultan lowered its fine for a first offense this year to conform to the new state law. Subsequent violations bring penalties of $150 and $250. "I was stunned," says Gee, who moved from Carnation three months ago. "Sultan is so small. Why do they feel the need for this? Now the kids are just smoking in the woods." Sultan schools, however, are joining the zero-tolerance campaign. Students caught smoking by police get detention or are ordered to attend school on Saturday, and they have to write essays explaining why they were smoking. Educators also have invited speakers, including a man who breathes through a tube in his throat, to demonstrate the dangers of tobacco use. Besides paying fines and being punished at school, youths cited for tobacco possession must appear with their parents before a six-member panel of community members that acts in lieu of a juvenile-court judge. "It's not just a bunch of strangers. It's people you're going to run into at the grocery store and everywhere else," says Mark Raney, a doctor who sits on the panel. The panel usually orders the young smokers to attend smoking-cessation classes and perform community service like cleaning up the cemetery or the local ballfield. Police in other King and Snohomish County police departments say they have started enforcing the new state law sporadically, but no one appears to be attacking teen smoking with anything approaching Sultan's zeal. "It depends what you want to focus your resources on," says Tim Buzzell, a Monroe police officer who has patrolled local schools. He has written about 15 tickets to underage smokers since the state law went into effect in summer. Seattle police are "not actively enforcing" the tobacco possession law until a study group decides what approach they ought to take, according to spokeswoman Carmen Best. Michael Bard, senior patrol officer for the Edmonds Police Department, says his officers usually just confiscate and destroy cigarettes, though they occasionally will issue tickets. Everyone involved says adolescents who really want to smoke are still finding ways. And state and national surveys indicate that teen smoking is on the rise. Twenty-nine percent of Washington state seniors said they were smokers this year, up from 25 percent in 1992. But Walser, who quit smoking decades ago, thinks just getting teens to hide their habit is a victory. "When other kids don't see that group sitting there smoking, they're less likely to try and join it," he says. "We send the wrong message to kids when we say it's illegal to possess tobacco and then just wink at it. We don't tolerate it in this city. We don't wink at it." - --- Checked-by: Pat Dolan